


Son of Winter

by Reijin_Hakumei



Series: Reign Over the Frosted Heavens [1]
Category: Bleach
Genre: 2k15 April Writing Challenge, Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Dark Fairy Tale Elements, Father-Son Relationship, M/M, Mentor/Protégé
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-26
Updated: 2020-04-26
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:54:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23858665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reijin_Hakumei/pseuds/Reijin_Hakumei
Summary: Toshiro has always been strange.  His looks, his intelligence, his abilities, none of it was normal.  So concerned with fitting in, he tries his best to hide his oddities from those around him.  Until the damn breaks and he can no longer hide.Excerpt:It was quiet here, the forest life hushed by the rain, creatures hiding in holes and under branches.  The only sounds a steady patter of water onto unyielding surfaces… and small, light footsteps against crushed needles.A lone boy walked amongst the trees, his steps faltering, his path unsure.  The clothes he wore were closer to rags and caught against the needles as he passed too close, tearing open yet more holes and further exposing delicate pale skin.He was shivering, small arms wrapping around themselves, teeth chattering, breath coming in staccato bursts.  It wasn’t really cold around him, and the rain was warm, almost hot against his exposed skin.The cold came from within.
Series: Reign Over the Frosted Heavens [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1719301
Comments: 29
Kudos: 69
Collections: IchiHitsu Ship Week and Archive, The Seireitei Server April Writing Challenge 2020





	Son of Winter

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ShiroStrawberry](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShiroStrawberry/gifts).



> This work was written for the Bleach April Challenge 2020 using the Forest Image Prompt.
> 
> I have enjoyed writing this so much that I have decided I will continue it in a series with an IchiHitsu pairing for ShiroStrawberry!
> 
> I do not own Bleach, nor the image used to prompt the story.

**Son of** **Winter**

Tall, mature pines towered around, the tops fading into a drizzly milky white mist, sky obscured by light rain. Drops fell from lush green needles onto a blanket of their brethren, covering the forest floor in green. Grass, fine and light, sprung through the thick layer, broken by fallen branches and twigs.

It was quiet here, the forest life hushed by the rain, creatures hiding in holes and under branches. The only sounds a steady patter of water onto unyielding surfaces… and small, light footsteps against crushed needles.

A lone boy walked amongst the trees, his steps faltering, his path unsure. The clothes he wore were closer to rags and caught against the needles as he passed too close, tearing open yet more holes and further exposing delicate pale skin.

He was shivering, small arms wrapping around themselves, teeth chattering, breath coming in staccato bursts. It wasn’t really cold around him, and the rain was warm, almost hot against his exposed skin.

The cold came from within.

He had always been strange. His hair was winter white, strands short and feathered into soft spikes, his eyes a glowing teal, not quite blue and not quite green. Strange. No one in his village had his features. He didn’t have any family that he was aware of, being raised in the orphanage after appearing on the doorstep one winter night. All alone, all night, the air freezing. And yet, in the morning, there he was. Alive. 

Strange.

He always felt cold. It didn’t matter how he tried to get warm, how many layers he wore.

He once tried to put his hand directly into the flame of a candle.

Upon touching his skin, the flame had flickered out.

During winter his fellow orphans would play out on the frozen water of the lake near their village. He remembered walking along alone at night, wanting to know if the icy surface would reflect the moon and stars as it did during the summer. His foot found a weak spot and he plummeted into the arctic water below. 

Teal eyes opened under the water. It didn’t feel cold.

Strange.

He looked up, seeing the hole he had fallen through, and calmly swam back to the surface and hauled himself out onto the ice. He sat there, allowing the wind to dry his thin clothes. He didn’t even notice it. His only thoughts were how beautiful the sky looked and what a shame it was that the ice was too uneven for that to reflect. 

Somehow, he always felt a sense of longing when he looked at the moon.

Like it was somehow waiting for him.

When he was dry he returned, slipping quietly back to his bed. Hours later, no colder than he ever was.

Strange.

The other children could tell he wasn’t normal. He was left alone but he had made his peace with that. He could still watch the others, learn through observation.

He watched from a tree as the martial artists performed their katas. The moon his only witness as he repeated the movements later. 

He listened as a wealthy mother read to her children, sitting below the open window. The stars his audience as he repeated the words later, eyes matching the letters to the sounds after he plucked the book from the table, long after the family had gone to bed.

He observed the local samurai as they trained with bokken, with arrows and bow, back against the barracks walls, slight form in shadow. The night air sung as he repeated their steps, blade cutting through the darkness, arrows sinking precise and deep.

And so the boy became skilled, with his body, with his mind, with weaponry. All, seemingly, without a teacher.

Strange.

He learned to be very careful with his words. Other children told lies, he could feel it from them as they did so. He had tried. Small things. 

“Do you need help reaching that?”

He had tried to say no. “Yes.”

“Do I look pretty in this dress?”

He had tried to say yes. “It is well suited to you.”

“Did you leave after curfew again?”

He had tried to say no. “I was in bed last night.”

He realized, over time, that for some reason he wasn’t able to outright lie. But, apparently, that didn’t stop him from answering with a different truth. He learned to mislead, to allow people to draw their own conclusions, tell themselves their own lies.

Strange.

He also realized he couldn’t break his word.

“I need you to fetch the water today. Fill all of the barrels.”

“Alright.”

The full bucket was too heavy for him back then so he was forced to ferry the water at half pace. Even so he walked slowly, his tiny arms straining. One of the older children should have been given this job. But he’d already agreed. This had been the first task he had accepted that he physically shouldn’t have been able to do.

He didn’t finish until midnight.

He had tried to stop when the matron called for dinner. His feet carried him on. He had tried again when he heard the bell that indicated it was time for bed. His hands wouldn’t release the bucket. No one had come to relieve him from his duty. His body forced him to carry on, forgotten.

This was the first of his oddities that truly scarred him.

He collapsed when he finally finished and crawled into bed, shaking.

He never outright agreed to do anything again.

Strange.

As he grew older, his skills became even more pronounced but he hid them well from the village. His pattern of speech was not that of a child’s. He spoke eloquently and carefully. When asked to do things we wouldn’t respond at all, rather he simply began the task, neither accepting or rejecting the request. Protecting against that all consuming obligation that had frightened him so badly.

He knew what he did was not normal and he held a fear in his heart of being rejected. For years his village had tolerated his presence. He was strange, yes, but still one of them.

He didn’t truly want to be alone.

And he wasn’t lonely, as long as he could observe, and thus learn, from others. He didn’t need them to be his friend.

He just needed them to allow him to stay.

That wasn’t possible anymore.

The boy had grown to an age of twelve and, unknown to his fellow villagers, that cold within him had grown with him. He kept his skin covered because whenever he touched something, he left behind a light frost. His clothing had become stiff against him so he now wore only loose smocks that helped hide how the fabric would not yield against his body.

It was a useless endeavor though, to think he could hide this from them.

One morning the room he shared with his fellow orphans had become covered in a thin layer of frost. It was the beginning of summer. They had awoken, cold, as he lay sleeping and undisturbed. An older girl, Momo, who had been one of the few to be kind to him, had grabbed his shoulder to awaken him.

Her scream was what jerked him awake as ice rapidly encased her fingers; she had grazed his bare skin.

He ran.

He didn’t stop for provisions, for keepsakes, for worried and angry voices. He just ran. The forest was forbidden, a place humans were not meant to tread. He had heard the warnings several times. He knew he would not be followed here.

That had been five days ago.

His knees hit the pine needles beneath him as he stumbled. He couldn’t go any further. He was so hungry, so thirsty, but most of all, he was so cold.

He curled around his knees, trying desperately to spread body heat. It had the opposite effect, chilling him even more. He was crying but the tears were freezing as soon as they hit his skin, encasing his eyes until he could no longer open them.

He couldn’t see.

He couldn’t move.

And he was becoming colder.

He started to scream and sob as he panicked. He had no idea who he was calling for, what he was pleading for. He just needed relief, he just needed all of this, whatever this was, to stop. He was in pain and terrified and so, so lost. Alone.

His voice, hysterical, echoed through the otherwise silent forest.

His mind was becoming sluggish, his thoughts clouding. He could tell he was slipping, consciousness becoming something slippery and fleeting to hold on to.

He thought he might have registered the sensation of being lifted. Perhaps the sound of wings.

The sound of thunder rumbling low, a word, a command.

To sleep.

When he awoke again it was winter. Or at least, he was surrounded by snow. But he was in a cave? It wasn’t possible to snow inside…

Teal eyes swept over his surroundings, trying to remain calm as he worked to assess his situation.

He seemed to be lying in a bank of snow, almost swallowed up by it except for his head. He could tell from the ceiling he was in fact in a cave, stalactites hanging ominously above him but encased in ice. Everywhere he looked was the stuff, white and sparkling in the sunlight that crept in from the mouth of the cave.

He was alive.

And even though he lay blanketed by snow, he wasn’t cold.

He wasn’t cold anymore.

That thought had him on his feet, inspecting himself.

Gone were the rags and his tattered smock. They had been replaced by an elegant kimono, the material soft and heavy, the color a lilac-tinted white with silver swirls detailing. It was belted together with a deep navy obi. Over top was a haori that fell to his ankles, the sleeves wide and long falling a few inches past his fingertips. It was the same navy as the obi but with those silver swirls. It reminded him of the wind somehow. And stars.

His feet were bare, as were his hands. They were dusted in frost but it easily flexed as he moved, not the least bit hindering his movement. He was unsettled by that but shrugged it off quickly. What did it matter if he froze everything his skin touched when it was already frozen?

That was odd as well though.

His bare feet didn’t feel the slightest bit cold upon the snow.

He reached down and cupped some into his small hands. It only felt soft to him. He couldn’t feel any difference in temperature. And, as he held it, not a bit melted against his hands.

Strange.

He let the snow fall through his fingers, deciding to wander outside. He blinked at the sight that greeted him, his mind having a bit of a hard time accepting it.

He was still in the forest, or at least, just on the outskirts of it since a sheer cliff face was to his back into which the cave opened. The tall, mature trees still stood stoically before him, reaching into that white, opaque sky. The light rain had stopped but it was still unnaturally quiet for a forest.

That wasn’t what bothered him.

Rather, it was the stretch of trees, directly in front of the mouth of the cave. As far back as he could see. 

They were covered in ice.

The ground too, was swallowed in a thick blanket of snow. The needles looked like thousands of crystals, reflecting the light and sparkling.

He just stared, completely captivated by the stark difference. Winter white flanked on both sides by the vibrant green of summer.

He didn’t know how long he stood there, his mind dazed at the contradiction, until he started badly at a chuckle behind him. 

He spun around at the sound, like rolling thunder, and noticed that a man had been watching him, perched atop a boulder beside the mouth of the cave. At least, he thought it was a man. 

He had long, teal hair, not unlike the color of the boy’s eyes, that cascaded in varied lengths down his back, spiking as it went. His complexion was darker but maybe it only seemed so because there was a large pale blue scar on the man’s face in the shape of an X, each line starting from the brow above an eye and extending to a corner of his jaw. Silver eyes stared, piercingly, observing the boy carefully, yet he seemed amused. There was warmth in those eyes, and a slight curl to his lips. 

The face seemed human enough.

He was dressed in a yukata, lilac with a bold navy blue stripe on each sleeve. A teal obi secured it around his waist, decorated with a hanging crescent sickle, but above it hung open to reveal form-fitting dark material against a sculpted chest. The yukata was not as long as the boy’s kimono, and so he could clearly see the man’s arms and legs.

Each distal phalanx were clawed, spikes extended from the wrists and ankles, and every part was entirely encased in thick ice.

Movement caught his eye as a long, teal, ice-tipped appendage lazily shifted as the man leaned forward slightly. The boy’s eyebrows rose as he realized what it was. A tail.

Definitely not human then.

He watched as the man gracefully dropped from where he had been perched and gestured for the boy to follow him back into the cave, that amused expression still on his face.

The boy hesitated but only for a moment. Whoever this was, it was clear that he had not harmed him and, though those claws looked threatening, the man wasn’t acting all that intimidating.

So he followed.

Upon returning to the cave, he stopped just inside as the man lifted a hand. Ice, seemingly coming from nothing, collected before him, taking shape. Chairs, the boy realized, tilted towards each other but not directly, facing the mouth of the cave. The man sat on one and gestured towards the other, silver eyes finding teal as he did so.

Cautiously the boy joined him, again surprised that the surface of the chair didn’t feel cold to him. It just felt like any other chair.

“My name is Hyourinmaru,” stated the man beside him, his voice low and rumbling like thunder.

The boy realized that had been what he heard last, back amongst the trees, just before passing out. This is who had found him. He had his suspicions but he was certain now, he didn’t think he could ever forget that voice.

Hyourinmaru. One who is like the moon. The boy thought the name suited him.

“My name is Toshiro.”

Hyourinmaru smiled. “Do you know the meaning behind your name?”

“Yes, I’ve learned how to read and write and can write my own name. It means ‘son of winter’.”

The man nodded. “Yes, that’s right. Do you remember who gave you that name?”

Gave? Toshiro thought hard. He didn’t have parents. He had been found. But somehow he knew, deep down, no one had named him. 

“I’ve always been Toshiro,” he said eventually with a bit of a confused look at the older man, “no one gave me that name. It’s who I am.”

Hyourinmaru nodded. “Yes, it was the same for me.”

“But, isn’t that wrong?” Toshiro asked, his eyes narrowing. “I know parents name their children. No one is simply born with a name.”

“You would be right, young one. No one is born already with a name. But you must have realized by now that you are different.”

Toshiro blinked up at him. “Of course, how could I not. Look at me!” He held his hands up in front of himself, flexing his fingers encased in ice.

Hyourinmaru laughed lightly at the boy’s expression. “Yes, clearly. You are not human. Moreover, you were not born. Our kind does not come into existence that way. There would have been no one to name you. You simply began, formed from the wish inside another’s heart, your name carved into your very soul. Our names tell the truth of us, have power over us.”

Hyourinmaru leaned closer, his expression stern as he made sure the boy was listening. “Never tell another your name. It is our greatest weakness. It can be used to summon you across great distances, even across realities. It can be used to bind you to another, to enslave your soul.”

Toshiro looked very alarmed, “But, then why did you give me your name? And why ask for mine? And my village, they all know my name!”

Hyourinmaru’s expression softened slightly, his iced hand covering one of the boy’s. Yet it didn’t feel odd to the boy; it only felt warm and gentle. “Do not worry about the humans, they would have forgotten every detail of you after a couple days no longer in your presence, nothing more than a dream to them. I gave you my name…” 

He paused, making sure he had the boy’s full attention. “Because it was my wish that brought about your existence. It is owed. It is fitting, required to give you that power over me. I could do nothing else. You now have the power to become my master, should you will it. 

“As for me knowing your true name, I am not able to use it to master your soul. You were created from my wish, to become my master. It cannot be the other way. While you hold my name I cannot give it to another. You hold that power now.”

The boy was startled at the explanation and very confused, “But that sounds terrible! Why would you want that? To have any master at all?”

Hyourinmaru smiled sadly at the youth, silver eyes aged and weighted, “You might understand, one day. We are not like the mortals you grew up with. Our lives are long, the time of this realm does not really affect us. We age if we want to but the laws of this reality are not able to contain what we are. I have been alone for so long, Master. I thought as you did once, that I would never wish for another, knowing what that would mean for my freedom. In the end this is a small price to pay to end my solitude. I have no regrets over my decision.”

“Well, I’m not comfortable being someone’s master, even voluntarily. So please don’t call me that.” The boy indeed looked a bit uncomfortable, teal eyes averted now, the hand he had clasped fidgeting under his grip.

“Then I will require another name to address you by. I am not willing to endanger you by using your true name.”

The boy seemed to think about this for a minute, his eyes unfocused and directed towards a cave wall. “Hitsugaya, then,” the boy decided. “That was the family name of the woman I used to listen to as she read to her children. She may not have known it but she taught me to read and write and she was never cruel to me. If there are any memories I’d like to keep of my time in that village, I suppose those moments listening outside her window were the most peaceful. What about you though? I can’t risk addressing you as Hyourinmaru…”

“It no longer matters for me. You are my master now, young one, only you have power over me. That is a part of the price that is paid. Only you can control me, regardless if another knows of my name.”

Toshiro nodded to show he understood but still looked a bit uncomfortable about the whole thing. “So,” he said, looking back over at his companion, “we’re not human. What are we?”

“We are fae, or faerie as you may be more familiar with. Do you know of the folklore humans spread of our kind?”

“Only a bit, and it’s probably littered with misinformation. I’d rather you simply explain it.”

“Well, fae are divided into two courts, summer and winter, which determines the aspects of our power as well as the time of year when we are strongest. Seelie are fae of the summer court and Unseelie are of the winter.”

“I presume we are Unseelie then,” Toshiro commented, a smirk on his lips.

“You would be correct. Our allegiance is to the winter court. The aspects of winter are water, darkness, and stillness. An Unseeli will be able, through sheer will alone, to manipulate water, to hide and conceal from all perception, to halt to the point of freezing. Summer is our opposite.

“None of the fae are able to tell a lie so don’t try, your voice will always reform the words into the truth. You will learn well how to answer by saying nothing at all, misdirecting. All fae are skilled in speechcraft out of necessity so be very wary of their words. Do not allow yourself to be led into the conclusions that they attempt to guide you to. Listen to what is not being said, even more so than what is.

“There are court royalty, the mother, queen, and daughter of winter. You would know them if you ever encounter them, their true nature cannot be concealed from anyone of the winter court. Should you ever come across them you must defer to them as it can be deadly to anger them and they easily take offence like all fae, but know that they have no power over your will. They may request something of you but as long as you do not make an agreement, you will remain free. They are masters at their art, and they never lose in a bargain. Of our entire kind, trust them the least and avoid entering into any kind of deal with them at all costs. You will always lose far more than you gain.”

The boy listened well as Hyourinmaru explained. “I think I understand. I realized it years ago that if I agreed to do something… it was like I was forced into completing it,” Toshiro said with apprehension, vividly remembering carrying water, back and forth, back and forth. “As well as not being able to lie. It was annoying at first but I eventually became used to speaking around questions I didn’t want to answer directly.”

“Yes, words hold great power over us, especially our own. When we make a deal with another our soul becomes entwined with theirs, forcing our actions and enslaving our will until the conditions for the release or completion of the vow have been met. Intention does not matter, the words themselves do. Do not enter into agreements lightly young one. Be careful of the promises you make.”

Toshiro nodded seriously. This was the one aspect of his power that terrified him the most and he knew he would continue to take great care with his words.

“This is also why your true name is such a danger to you. If another knows it, they can bind you into contracts for you, agreeing on your behalf.”

Teal eyes widened, panicked, “Seriously? I can’t even imagine! Why did you give me your name? I don’t want this power! What if I mess up?”

“Calm, young one,” Hyourinmaru said, gathering the frightened child into his lap and running a soothing hand along his back. “Like I said, you were born from my wish. I know you would not do me any harm and I trust you completely. You do not have it in your heart to harm me, just as I cannot hope to harm you. You are my master, regardless if you claim the title or not, and as such my well being has been etched into your soul. Calm now, concentrate. Can you feel it?”

Toshiro tried to do as instructed. He felt very safe in Hyourinmaru’s arms, protected. He had never felt like that before. Like he belonged somewhere. Belonged with someone. He concentrated on that feeling, stilling in the hold, breathing evening out. Something flickered inside him, a feeling of warmth deep in the core of his being. He reached for it and then there was a shift within him. One presence became two. Another’s feelings existing alongside his own, another’s thoughts accompanying his. Separate yet somehow intertwined.

“Yes young one, that is our bond. You can feel it now, I can tell. I will teach you to control it, to choose what you share with me, what you receive from me in return. You are the master and so you are in control of this but I can guide you. I’ll have some control over it as well, as long as you will that to be true.”

Toshiro felt overwhelmed. Hyourinmaru was ancient, he was so full of memories, his soul greater and richer, a bonfire next to Toshiro’s small flame. He felt the presence start to recede, fade into the background of his awareness, and he let out a shaky breath of relief. 

“Thank you,” Toshiro managed after a minute, “That was more than I could sort through on my own.”

“Do not worry yourself, young one, you will learn. Your power is greater than you can imagine and it will grow as you do. I am so proud, I couldn’t be happier with the result of my wish.”

Toshiro looked up, teal eyes meeting silver, “I don’t know if I’ll ever understand why you wished for me, for a master. But I’m glad that you’re happy with the result and I guess I’m grateful for my existence. Now, at least.”

Silver eyes softened as he replied, “You are my master because of the bond that is created when one of our kind wishes another into existence. But a master is not what I wished for. I wished for a son.”

Teal eyes widened, “Son?”

“Yes,” Hyourinmaru’s voice still rumbled like thunder, but it was comforting and full of warmth. “You were well named. I wanted a child, someone I could care for. I wanted to be needed, to be relied upon, to have a family. The bond between parent and child can be one of the strongest between two beings and I greatly desired such a bond.

“I felt you, when you came into being, a small spark across my consciousness. I had been looking for you ever since but was unable to find you. I soon realized why and became even more desperate. You had locked your power inside you, forcibly containing it within to protect those around you and prevent them from learning of that power’s existence. It was tearing you apart from within.”

Hyourinmaru held him closer, his chin resting atop soft white locks. “I almost lost you. You have so much power, young one, I’ve never seen such control over winter. Especially in one so young. Your power had begun to leak from you, freezing everything around you. That’s how I was finally able to find you, to feel where you were. 

“You were barely alive by the time I got to you, your own power killing you, freezing you from within. I brought you here, nearby but out of the way, and I used our bond to help you release your power from the tight cage you had trapped it in. Your winter encased this cave, beaming out into the trees outside, for miles. We are not meant to keep our ice locked within us like that, our bodies cannot contain it forever, cannot handle the strain.”

He pulled away to look once more into Toshiro’s eyes as he said seriously, “Please never do that again. Never lock away your power so tightly that you put yourself in danger.”

Toshiro knew better than to verbally agree so instead he embraced him, trying to communicate his intention without the words. “I didn’t know,” he mumbled against Hyourinmaru’s chest, “I didn’t understand what was happening or how to resolve it. I just didn’t want to hurt anyone. I know better now. I’ll trust you to show me how to safely use my power. I don’t want to cage it again.”

Toshiro felt a soothing hand on his back and smiled up at Hyourinmaru. It would take time, determination, patience, and understanding, from both of them, but Toshiro knew they could do it. Hyourinmaru was, after all, the reason he existed. Toshiro knew in his soul he could trust him to teach and care for him.

And in return, Toshiro would make him proud.

His heart swelled as he realized that he had found what he had been searching for as well.

He wasn’t alone.

And now, feeling the bond pulsing within him, he knew he never would be.


End file.
